If you hate the thought of going anywhere near a spider, help could be at hand.

Scientists have tested a new method to allow people who suffer from debilitating phobias, based on 'exposure therapy'.

The technique involves showing the patient phobic images in such short bursts that they aren't even consciously aware of seeming them.

The researchers believe that their technique could be used to cure a range of phobias, including a fear of spiders, and even anxiety.

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If you hate the thought of going anywhere near a spider, help could be at hand, as scientists have created a new short exposure technique to help people overcome their phobias

The technique was devised by researchers from the Institute for the Developing Mind at Children's Hospital Los Angeles.

They showed patients images of their phobia without their knowledge, and looked at their brain's response using fMRI scanning.

Dr Bradley Peterson, who led the study, said: 'Although we expected - and observed - activation of the neural regions that process fear, we also found activation in regions that regulate the emotional and behavioural responses to fear - reducing the conscious experience of fear.'

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In the study, the researchers focused on 21 people with a fear of spiders, and 21 non-phobic control participants.

All participants experienced three conditions that included viewing control images not associated with phobias (flowers) and phobia-inducing images (spiders) at two levels of exposure - very brief (without awareness) and longer duration (clearly visible).

The very brief exposure was accomplished through a technique known as backward masking.

In backward masking, a target image is shown very briefly and then immediately followed by a non-target image or 'mask' that prevents recognition of the target.

While the images were shown, the participants had their brains scanned using fMRI scanning.

Brain scans showed that brief exposure to phobic images activated the regions of the brain associated with fear processing. But the participants did not experience fear consciously because the very brief exposures also activated brain regions that regulate fear

In the participants with the phobia, very brief exposure to spider images strongly activated the subcortical regions of the brain involved in immediate fear processing.

Yet they did not experience fear consciously, apparently because the very brief exposures also activated brain regions that regulate fear.

Clearly visible exposure to the spider images, by contrast, deactivated areas of the brain that regulate fear responses, inducing the conscious experience of fear.

IS A FEAR OF SPIDERS IN OUR DNA?

Recent research has claimed that a fear of spiders is a survival trait written into our DNA.

Dating back hundreds of thousands of years, the instinct to avoid arachnids developed as an evolutionary response to a dangerous threat, the academics suggest.

It could mean that arachnophobia, one of the most crippling of phobias, represents a finely tuned survival instinct.

And it could date back to early human evolution in Africa, where spiders with very strong venom have existed millions of years ago.

Study leader Joshua New, of Columbia University in New York, said: 'A number of spider species with potent, vertebrate specific venoms populated Africa long before hominoids and have co-existed there for tens of millions of years.

'Humans were at perennial, unpredictable and significant risk of encountering highly venomous spiders in their ancestral environments.'

Dr Paul Siegel, first author of the study, said: 'Counter-intuitively, our study showed that the brain is better able to process feared stimuli when they are presented without conscious awareness.

'Our findings suggest that phobic people may be better prepared to face their fears if at first they are not consciously aware that they've faced them.'

The researchers believe that their technique could be used to treat both people with phobias, and children and adolescents with anxiety.

Current therapies are based on directly confronting the feared stimulus, which can cause young people to experience significant emotional distress.